Big Ole, Viking (and Don, Canadian). The birthplace of America claim is based on the discovery of a runestone supposedly carved by Viking settlers. More importantly, this area was the birthplace and early stomping grounds of one Mr. Robert Zimmerman, one of whose greatest songs invokes the road that carries you through it: Highway 61.
About where we got on Highway 61, in St. Paul, and somehow appropriate for a highway that runs from Minnesota all the way along the Mississippi to New Orleans, a legendary American highway ...
There's something wrong with this sign! Well, I guess it is Minnesota. Almost Canadian.Next stop, of interest to Dylan fans (wrong state, Detroit Red Wings fans):
If you are a Dylan fan, you may know the early song, Walls of Red Wing. I always assumed it was an ordinary prison - wrongly. It was a juvenile detention center - the sort of place an unruly young Minnesotan might have feared ending up:
Another source of inspiration?
That's POP 697. Highway 61 through Minnesota was most striking for its pretty hill-and-dale small-town and rural Americana.
Hills, trees, cliffs, fields, barns, tidy, prosperous homes and picturesque Main Streets - even the famous muddy Mississippi starts out bright and shiny here. A somewhat anti-climactic counterpoint to Highway 61 Revisited (lyrics), until I realized (or imagined): this bland, middle America - this is what the song is about, where it's set, even, especially, here among these quiet, prosperous, insular towns and farms, and it could hardly be more relevant today if he called out the latest war-mongers by their names:Now the rovin' gambler he was very bored
He was tryin' to create a next world war
He found a promoter who nearly fell off the floor
He said I never engaged in this kind of thing before
But yes I think it can be very easily done
We'll just put some bleachers out in the sun
And have it on Highway 61.